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Cultural Hotspot

Inspiration

Living in the United States, we’re surrounded by an incredibly diverse population. However, we noticed that many second-generation immigrants sometimes feel disconnected from their cultural roots. This inspired us to build Cultural Hotspot—a website dedicated to helping people reconnect with their heritage by discovering local cultural spots and communities. We wanted to create something that shows people that culture is all around us, just waiting to be explored.

What It Does

Cultural Hotspot lets users explore nearby cultural places through an interface inspired by Google Maps. You can test it out by clicking the demo, which highlights various cultural hotspots in your area—be it a small grocery store, a cultural center, or a community event.

How We Built It

We built the project using:
Next.js for the full-stack web application framework
TypeScript for type safety and better developer experience
Tailwind CSS for responsive and clean styling
Google Maps API to integrate location-based services

We made our plan and divided tasks based on strengths and learning goals, which helped keep the workflow smooth even with different experience levels.

Challenges We Ran Into

One of the biggest challenges we faced was time management, especially since two of our members were relatively new to coding. Balancing learning with building under time pressure was tough, but it also pushed us to support each other and grow as a team.

Accomplishments We're Proud Of

We’re especially proud of our interactive map. It’s fun, intuitive, and visually engaging—something we worked hard on to make sure it adds real value to the user experience.

What We Learned

We learned that there’s always a cultural space nearby—you just have use our website. Building this project opened our eyes to the richness of communities that exist even in places we thought we knew well.

What’s Next for Cultural Hotspot

We plan to:

• Improve the UI for a more polished experience
  
• Expand the demo with more data and features
  
• Add user-submitted spots and reviews
  

This is just the beginning. Cultural Hotspot has the potential to grow into a platform that celebrates and connects cultures across neighborhoods and generations.

Built With

• gemini
• nextjs
• react
• tailwind-css